Chimp Conservation Plan Drafted

An ambitious plan to save one of mankind’s closest relatives – the
chimpanzee – has been hatched by East and Central African nations along
with conservation groups.

The 10-year plan would aim to protect chimps from hunting, habitat loss, disease and other threats.

"The conservation of wild populations is important not only for conservation, but also for the survival of chimpanzee cultures
in the region that are invaluable to helping us define our own place
within the natural realm," said James Deutsch of the Wildlife
Conservation Society's Africa Program.

The eastern chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii),
which is known to use tools, is currently classified as "Endangered" on
the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s Red List of
endangered species
and occurs in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of
Congo, Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania and Zambia.

Threats to the subspecies include: hunting for bushmeat;
the capture of infant chimpanzees for the pet trade; the loss and
fragmentation of habitat due to agriculture; mining and other forms of
human development; and disease.

In one of the most far-reaching efforts to assess the status and
conservation threats to eastern chimpanzees, conservation practitioners
and researchers with experience from all seven states where the chimps
are found contributed data on sightings, nests, feeding signs, and
vocalizations from the past decade.

"This effort to assess the status of eastern chimpanzees will help
us to focus our conservation actions more effectively," said Andrew
Plumptre, director of the Wildlife Conservation Society's Albertine
Rift Program and the plan's lead author. "In the next decade, we hope
to minimize the threats to these populations and the ecological and
cultural diversity they support."

During an August 2009 workshop, more than 30 experts from seven
countries traveled to Kampala, Uganda, to identify priorities for the
conservation of the subspecies, and to develop an action plan with
specific projects for their conservation.

Gaps had to be filled in for some areas off-limits to research because of conflicts.

Participants in the workshop identified 16 chimpanzee units that if
successfully protected, would safeguard 96 percent of known chimpanzee
populations (estimated to total some 50,000 individual animals).

Eastern chimpanzees are among the best studied of the great apes, due in large part to the work of researchers such as Jane Goodall, who started her fieldwork in Gombe Stream National Park in western Tanzania 50 years ago.

However, the total numbers of eastern chimpanzees across their whole
range is poorly known and the models used by the researchers revealed
the total population may number as many as 200,000 (almost double the
estimates that had been made previously).

"It is clear that we know about the distribution and abundance of
only a quarter of the world population of the eastern chimpanzee," said
Liz Williamson, the Species Survival Commission Great Ape Coordinator
for the IUCN. "There are large areas of the Congo basin where we know
very little about this ape."

The plan also targets two of the greatest threats to the species —
illegal hunting and trafficking — with a goal of reducing both to half
of current levels across most of the animal's range.

Other objectives include: reducing the rate of forest loss in
chimpanzee habitats; filling in knowledge gaps in chimpanzee
distribution, status and threats; improving the understanding of health
risks to chimpanzee populations, including human-transmitted diseases;
increasing community support for chimpanzee conservation; and securing
sustainable financing for chimpanzee conservation units.

This article was provided by OurAmazingPlanet, a sister site to LiveScience.

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